The applicant is the owner of a co-pending Australian patent application 2006202071 relating to the production of barrel staves. The contents of this co-pending application are incorporated by reference herein.
Wine is traditionally aged in oak barrels. The oak is integral to aging and imparting certain flavours to the wines. Wine fermenting and aging in wood barrels extracts flavour components from the wood and leaves a residue of precipitated materials such as tartrates, fining agents or yeast. Wine processing often leaves undesirable bacterial infections in the barrels for which there is no current remedy.
Wine penetrates into a solid barrel stave approximately 0.5-0.8 centimeters. Over time (typically after two to three uses), all components which can be extracted from the oak will be, and the residue left in the wood can begin to sour or block the membrane exchangeability of the wood. The barrel is then considered exhausted and is viewed either as a liability because of contamination, or as neutral storage for additional vintages.
Currently, reconditioning involves transporting used barrels from vineyards to cooperage plants where the internal surfaces of the barrels are shaved and then toasted for reuse. Shaving methods vary from more simple techniques involving bottom cutting routers and rotating wire brushes, to more complex methods involving motorised cutting apparatus. Although inadequate, however, these services remain available because they are able to remove a small amount of the barrel's inner surface for a very modest fee. Conventional cutting devices suffer from some of the following drawbacks:                Current techniques, particularly manual shaving methods, often result in uneven surfaces and do not provide a shaved surface that is reflective of the pre-shaved surface.        Such techniques are also problematic because they do not ensure that all areas of the barrel are shaved to a depth where the exposed wood is uncontaminated from previous wine.        The quality of the surface is often compromised using traditional shaving techniques. Sometimes, the shaved surface requires sanding and this causes greater deterioration to the barrel surface because it grinds the exhausted wood into the pores of the newly exposed wood. When the barrel is re-toasted, very undesirable “off” flavours are baked into the new surface.        The time taken to completely shave the inside of a barrel is significant, given that this is often done manually. The skilled addressee would realise the benefits in being able to quickly and efficiently recondition a barrel back to a useful state without the need for manual labor.        
It is an object of the present invention to overcome this problem or to at least provide the public with a useful alternative.